Promotion
by Emerial
Summary: Because things change. It's your loss if you don't adapt. [Rufus. Tifa. The shaky beginnings, and a partnership with the deadline drawn at death.]
1. Chapter 1

**the morning after**

He wakes up dry-mouthed, an alcohol-induced pounding in his head. He doesn't remember making it to the bed, or the apartment, for that matter. Neither does he recall tucking himself so neatly beneath the blanket.

He only recalls the cheering crowd, loud music as the solemn ceremony gave way to rowdy celebration. Applauses and handshakes. And obligatory toasts. One obligatory toast too many.

Bleary-eyed, Rufus sits up with a groan, hand immediately going to his head. The taste of wine is still on his tongue, in his breath, and he feels disgusting—and a great degree of rue as he wonders of his conduct after blacking out last night. Wonders if he'd rather ask someone about it or let the incidents (if any) slide into oblivion.

It just so happens he actually has the choice this time, seeing as the one person who never would've allowed him to live an embarrassment down is no longer around.

Some way or another, he won the fight with the bed sheets and finds himself beneath the showerhead. As the glass panels fog over, warm water blesses his rigid muscles, seeping into grease-matted hair and wrinkled dress shirt and slacks. There are a few missing buttons toward his collar, but it just means he can be rid of it that much faster.

_"'til death," he promised._

_The same promise returned. Eyes deep as the wine he swirled, that the smile didn't quite reach._

Head rested against the tiled wall, he attempts to organize his thoughts. Seems it's going to be a while longer to get the alcohol completely out of his system.

He discards his soaked clothes into the wicker, noting the towel already inside. The bedroom doesn't seem like it's been disturbed. Things remain where he's left them, save for the jacket and vest he doesn't recall taking off draped over the back of the chair. He finishes securing the towel around himself and goes to get dressed.

Out in the living area is sunlit. He notices immediately the existence of things on what would usually be an empty kitchen counter. It's not a complete outrage, just different. His eyes follow the path of displacement and sure enough finds the culprit with knees drawn to her chest on the floor, staring out the window and down at the city streets below.

"Good morning." She doesn't look at him as she sets down a can of beer with a small _clink_, next to what he assumes are similarly empty ones beside her.

"That doesn't seem to be the case for us both."

"I asked Balto to bring hangover medicine. It's on the counter."

If nothing else, that explains the beer cans. Rufus can only question what Katana was thinking when he deemed it fit to deliver the medicine together with more alcoholic beverages.

He gives the small bottle perching on the edge of the counter an evaluating look. Not that he has enough (or any) prior experience with consuming this branch of products to judge. It looks to be the type that one drinks. Even with all his reservations, the idea of liquid intake is very tempting right now.

"It's very effective and not poison."

He looks back to her with a brow raised. Her back is still to him, her hair a dark stream, falling past her waist and pooling all around her. Something in the way the sunlight frames her outline makes for a lonely sight, more so when imposed upon the vibrant morning outside. He blames the residual alcohol in his system.

"I'd like to apologize for any untoward behaviour last night," he says carefully.

She might have shrugged at that. Might've not.

He grabs the medicine and twists open the cap, taking a large swig of the content. Fruity. He settles down next to her on the floor, careful not to knock over any of the cans in case there's still any left inside.

She gives him a side-long glance but says nothing still. There's a glaze to her stare that lets him know she's not all there. But there enough.

"I hope this doesn't become a habit." She stops playing with the rim of a beer can to look at him again. "I do need you vigilant."

"It's just beer." At his look she turns away, burying her face into her arms. "Just this one time."

He can hear the ticking of the clock as he studies her, chin in his palm. The pair of black shorts she has on leaves her long legs exposed. He can't remember the last time he's seen so much of her skin. She seems more a girl than a woman right now, curling into herself, matted hair caught in the little knots and tangles she hasn't bothered undoing.

"Cloud gave us his blessings."

He nods even though she wouldn't see it. "How unexpected." And unwelcomed. In his murky memory there is a scene of her and _him _together. His last few moments of clarity before more wine was shoved his direction.

"I haven't seen him in months." She lifts her head slightly to stare at him. "He looked relieved."

"I see."

She begins to play with the beer can again.

"Miss Lockhart—" Her hand flies up with a snap, smacking him audibly as it closes over his mouth. Beer cans clattering noisily by his knee. Her red eyes beseeching. He can smell the bitterness of beer on her fingertips as he continues. "You should go dry your hair."

She laughs breathily and drops her hand to the floor, returning her gaze to the city below. He rights the fallen cans, frowning at the dark specks on his trousers.

"I didn't want to wake you with the hairdryer."

"I don't imagine that's a problem now?"

"Never thought you'd be one to fuss."

He picks up a dark lock, testing the dampness between his fingers. "You have beautiful hair. It would be regretful if rumours were to spread that I couldn't even attend to my wife's basic grooming."

She meets his eyes for a length, the blankness of her expression betraying little more than some semblance of curiosity. "How's your head?"

He considers the dull throbbing in his skull and downs the rest of the medicine. "Better." He places the bottle down beside the empty cans. "My gratitude."

"Only when it takes effect do I get the thank you." When he smiles, thick dark lashes narrow around her eyes. She runs a hand through her hair and flicks the long locks over her shoulder and out of his grasp. His gaze follows her as she makes to stands, dusting off the back of her shorts.

"What a boorish husband."

She stalks into the bedroom and it's not long before he can hear the howl of the hairdryer. He sits there studying the way the sunlight dances on the aluminium, wondering if she meant to make him _clean_ as reparation for whatever she sees him guilty of.

A lot has changed – with him, with her. Between them. But that just now was just _different_, and he's tempted to chalk it all up to the alcohol.

He thinks about the clothes hung neatly on the back of his chair. His undisturbed room and sleep. The taste on his tongue (orange?), the blanket that was smothering him when he first woke.

And he starts gathering the trash.


	2. Chapter 2

**with the wind and the sun**

She treads on along the rocky beach, hands clasped at her back and naked feet sinking into the chafing brown sand. She doesn't know for how long she's been walking, so lost in her trains of thoughts, only that she's a little hungry, a little flushed from the heat of the sun, and alone.

For all her need for companionship, she does like the solitude.

The sky is blue. Bright. The sea hums pleasantly, cool waves sucking at her ankles, and the briny wind carries the whine of a cargo ship returning to port. Up ahead there's a row of palm trees, their pinnate canopies rustling, pulling her to the welcoming shadows.

_"__Tell me immediately if he hurts you." Cloud drew his hand through her hair, kinder than he'd ever been._

_"__What would you do then?" His smile turned into confusion. His hand retreated from her. "If I told you?" She sounded caustic and she knew it. It wasn't like her to take it out on him._

_"__Did he…?"_

_Mako eyes widened as he inferred the worst. She shook her head. "No." The irony was not lost on her as to who was not hurting her, and who was able to._

The dry sand burns her skin. In the short sprint to the shade she suddenly feels carefree, like the breeze rushing through the folds of her clothes would catch her should she fall. But then that feeling ends just as abruptly. Her vision is filled with stars. She settles against the rough trunk and allows herself to adapt to the darkness.

Somewhere out of sight there's the laughter of children and the cries of the seagulls. She rubs her feet together to rid them of the grey grains of sand and smiles to herself, dull thumping between her ribs. She doesn't know where she's left her heels. Eyes closed, she sees his face again, even after all these long months.

_"__Tifa-"_

_"__Don't worry." And, __"__Just a bit. Let me stay like this."_

_Her forehead rested against Cloud's warm chest, warm heartbeats, but her hands are kept strictly at her sides. Her silly little heart did not quicken like it once had, only slowed. Sank like a thousand pounds in the vast ocean._

_"__Don't worry about me."_

_His eyes narrowed with tenderness. "But I do."_

_It was a common mistake people made, confusing pity with love. They were old enough now not to. She smiled in return, unable to help the crease between her own brows. "This is what I want."_

_His lips became a thin line. __"__All right." And he left._

"Must you waste time in this manner?"

The voice snaps her out of her thoughts, and she looks up from her fistful of sand and nearly snorts when she sees him moving toward her underneath the shade provided by the umbrella held by a Turk. Wingtip shoes crush the sand in decided steps, he stops beside her underneath the flickering shadows and waves the Turk away.

"Like you're spending it any more wisely in meetings where nothing gets resolved."

"I'm not surprised diplomacy is lost on you."

It's not, but she doesn't think he cares to correct that opinion.

She stares up at him and tries to decipher his intention in coming to find her all the way down here. The black pair of sunglasses he has on shields more of his thoughts than usual, and she gives up.

"They're good." The slightest tilt of his head conveys his unvoiced question. "The Turks. I was pretty sure I bought myself more time than this." She even slipped her PHS with the tracker into another woman's bag to give them a little run-around. She briefly wonders how long it took for them (for him?) to start worrying, if at all.

"A woman dressed as you are boarding the public elevator will naturally draw attention." He gestures at the expensive black one piece she has on. "We only had to ask."

She keeps forgetting how much she stands out now from the grunge and grit, how coddled she must seem draped in the layers of spilling extravagance simply to walk next to him.

"I'll remember to bring a change of clothes next time."

"I'd pray there isn't a next time." There's a hint of exasperation in his otherwise lazy tone. "You're not in a position to wander around in public unattended."

In another life, she would have taken great offense at the way he seeks to control her movement, and the galling notion of being treated like some fragile damsel. Now she's just amused. If he were anyone else, she might have thought he was concerned for her well-being. But if that then it wouldn't have been the baby Turks following her around only for her to lose them.

"Unlike you, Shinra, I'm only worth anything alive." Tifa is mighty pleased with herself with that small jab, even knowing he cares not how the world views him. She pushes into the sand to get to her feet. Facing him on levelled ground, she smiles.

"I won't be taken alive."

His chuckle is almost inaudible in the strong wind that blows her hair aflutter. The sunlight dances on him, reflects off his sunglasses. She can almost see the blue eyes behind the dark lenses. "I think you're trying to bring WRO's wrath down on me."

"What needless worry. Reeve was furious last we spoke." She waves at the thought, trying to be nonchalant. But her smile turns bitter as she recalls the disappointment and betrayal in Reeve's eyes when she told him of her decision.

Rufus looks at her, silent, assessing. "Do you believe yourself any less dear to the Commissioner because of that?"

She blinks. He reaches past her cheek, and she doesn't flinch when his hand brushes into her hair. Tiny bumps spread across her skin as his searing fingertips slide along the cup of her ear and lift up the small marble dangling from her earring to scrutiny.

"Even if it's not written down in the book, being affiliated with Shin·Ra guarantees that one will never get a materia license." And he lets go, retreats into his own space. "Reeve is canny foe, Miss Lockhart, but also a sentimental man."

She doesn't know what to say to that, so, "I hear jealousy."

He considers that without snark and nods. "Close enough. I can think of many occasions where materia would have been…preferable." His gaze drifts. Silence settles between them, not uncomfortably. The leaves rustle. She casts her gaze out into the sunny, rocky beach. The low whine of cargo ships and the grumble of the waves. The children and the gulls.

"It's too bright here," he says, hand held out to her.

"Are we ready to head back?"

"I guess you do need your decoration back." She takes his hand, and he snorts.

"Last I checked, decorations did not move on their own." Then his grip tightens, drawing her attention to his eyes behind the sunglasses. "You feel powerless." Something in the pit of her stomach twists and her heart begins to beat out of order. Suddenly, he's seeing through too much and making her feel vulnerable and pathetic and she wants to run away again. His grip doesn't let her.

"I'll remind you that this isn't where I have a use for you."

"Know your own worth, Miss Lockhart."

She hesitates, thinks and wonders and ponders, still unable to decipher those eyes hiding behind the lenses. The rhythm inside her chest regulates itself, still rapid, but uplifted. She returns his grip in a semblance of the handshake they'd shared before that sealed their agreement. It feels like an eternity ago.

"Fine. I'll be patient."

"Excellent." His signature smirk creeps onto his lips.

And they climb the hills of sand and rocks, hands to themselves, and meet up with the Turks. The baby Turks are there too, turning disapproving looks on her but saying nothing. Before joining him in the car, she glances one last time over her shoulder at the wind-swept beach below.

"I did not realize you were fond of the sea. I could arrange for Costa del Sol. Much less sharp debris." He's looking at her scratched up feet. Seated, she shakes her head and reaches down to heal herself, materia softly glowing by her jaw.

"My experiences with it can be counted on one hand. Most of them less than pleasant."

Still she looks out the window as the car steadily accelerates. And she wonders if the sky is clearer, or if the water is simply frothing less.

The Junon beach in her memory didn't have quite the same charm.


End file.
